Ireland’s low cost airline Ryanair will study a possibility of opening new bases in Ukraine, along with Kyiv and Lviv, and launching of domestic flights.
An Interfax-Ukraine correspondent has reported that Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary gave this information at a press conference in the Boryspil airport (Kyiv) on Friday devoted to the arrival of the airline to Ukraine.
“We will study the possibility of launching domestic flights. We hope that maybe in the not-too-distant future we would be able to speak about opening of bases not only in Kyiv and Lviv, but also in other cities of Ukraine,” he said.
As reported, the Boryspil and Lviv international airports on Friday, March 23, signed contracts with low-cost air carrier Ryanair on the beginning of flights to Ukraine. The company has already started selling tickets for Ukrainian flights in its booking system.
Present at the event, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said that Ryanair will start flights in October 2018 and launch flights to 10 destinations from Kyiv, five from Lviv and in the first year of operation will transport 1 million Ukrainians.
In turn, O’Leary corrected him: “We do not expect that there will be a million Ukrainians in the first 12 months of operation. 40% of them will be European travelers who will come to Ukraine. We expect 850,000 passengers for the first year, and for the second year, it is possible to cross the line of 1 million.”
According to him, Ukraine is becoming a very attractive tourist destination. “We expect that we will bring hundreds of thousands of Europeans to Kyiv, Lviv and eventually to Odesa and other cities,” the head of Ryanair said.
He thanked Minister of Infrastructure of Ukraine Volodymyr Omelyan and his team for “very tough negotiations that had been going on in recent months,” adding that the airline is inspired, it is ready to grow rapidly and develop its presence in the country.
The PSA Group in Ukraine plans to increase the share of the new passenger car and commercial vehicle market in 2018 to 6.2% compared with 4.63% in 2017, including the share of the Peugeot brand will be 3.75% and Citroen – 2.45% (2.75% and 1.88% respectively in 2017).
Director General of Peugeot Citroen Ukraine Viktor Kordilevsky said at a press conference on Thursday that it is expected that the new passenger car and commercial vehicle market this year could expand by 20% on 2017, to 105,000 vehicles, while the pessimistic scenario is 9% growth to 95,000 vehicles.
Kordilevsky said that the Ukrainian market could reach the pre-crisis volume (200,000 vehicles) no earlier than in five years.
He said that imports of used cars and bringing of cars with European registration affects the market.
“Among negative trends is migration of the population abroad, as these are potential buyers of cars,” he said.
He said that in 2017, the PSA group significantly strengthened its position in the Ukrainian market of new cars, selling more than 4,000 cars of Peugeot, Citroen and DS brands – by 47% more than a year ago with a 25% market growth – to 87,600 units, including 2,400 Peugeot cars sold (47.6% more) and 1,600 Citroen cars (46.3%).
At the same time, the sales volume in the SUV segment (crossovers and off-road vehicles of different segments, sizes, price niches) amounted to 42,300 units, that is, almost half of the total Ukrainian car market. The share of this segment grows year after year.
Metinvest mining and metal group could create a joint venture with Italy’s Marcegaglia SpA for the acquisition of the steel works in Galati, Romania (former SIDEX) if ArcelorMittal Group decides to sell it. According to Ziarul Financiar, which refers to Reuters, ArcelorMittal could sell its metal division in Galati to meet European antimonopoly legislation during the acquisition of Ilva steel plant in Italy.
According to the report, the European Commission proposed to ArcelorMittal to sell other assets, including the plant in Galati, which today produces 2 million tonnes of steel a year, when the commission considered the approval to acquire the Italian plant by ArcelorMittal.
The possible buyer could be JV of Metinvest and Marcegaglia, Ziarul Financiar’s sources familiar with the deal said.
Boryspil (Kyiv) and Lviv international airports have signed agreements on the start of flights to Ukraine with Ireland’s low cost airline Ryanair. An Interfax-Ukraine correspondent has reported that Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary signed the agreements with Director General of the Boryspil airport Pavlo Riabikin and Director General of Lviv airport Tetiana Romanovska on Friday at the Boryspil airport in the presence of Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
The airline has started selling tickets for Ukrainian flights in its booking system.
Poroshenko said that Ryanair will start flying in October 2018 and will launch flights to 10 destinations from Kyiv and five from Lviv.
The Ukrainian president said that the arrival of the airline to Ukraine is the seal of quality of investment climate. He said that the tickets for Ukrainians will be cheaper than EUR 40 and the airline seeks to carry 1 million Ukrainians in the first year of its operation.
Ukraine International Airlines (UIA, Kyiv), a leading airline in the country, tentatively saw UAH 304.5 million of net loss in 2017 compared with UAH 387.885 million of net profit in 2016. The information is outlined in the agenda of the general meeting of the company’s shareholders scheduled for April 25, 2018.
The company’s assets as of December 31, 2017 were UAH 4.222 billion, which is 16.2% more than a year ago.
Total bills receivable grew by 6%, to UAH 1.763 billion, and uncovered loss – by 12%, to UAH 2.834 billion. Noncurrent liabilities fell by 28%, to UAH 550.9 million and current grew by 21.1%, to UAH 6.214 billion. Net worth last year rose by 12.6%, to UAH 2.542 billion.
Ukraine International Airlines was founded in 1992. It connects Ukraine with more than 50 cities and key points in Europe, Asia, America, Africa, the Middle East and the CIS countries and provides connection with the routes of partner airlines in more than 3,000 cities of the world. UIA performs more than 1,100 regular flights a week.
Private joint-stock company APK-Invest (Donetsk region), a large pork producer in Ukraine, would retain the current structure of owners and plans large expansion, the owner of the company, Borys Kolesnikov, has told Interfax-Ukraine. “No sale of APK-Invest company. On the contrary, the company plans to expand pig numbers to 1 million, while today it has 570,000 pigs,” he said.
Kolesnikov said that APK-Invest also plans to introduce several new technologies in agriculture that are widely used in Western Europe and the United States, but they are new not only for Ukraine, but for many countries of Eastern Europe.
According to an announcement of the company made on March 21 on holding of the annual general meeting of its shareholders on April 23, APK-Invest saw UAH 889.09 million in net profit in 2017, and UAH 36.52 million will be sent to pay dividends and UAH 849.78 million for development.
Total costs of assets grew by 16.7%, to UAH 5.157 billion and net worth rose 1.5-fold, to UAH 3.178 billion.
As for the report of the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine on the provision of preliminary conclusions on the necessity of receiving a permit to buy shares in the company by individuals, Kolesnikov said that this is internal restructuring of APK-Invest, which would not affect the ownership structure. APK-Invest is a vertically integrated agro-industrial company with a complete closed cycle of production of chilled pork from growing grain and animal feed production to production and sale of meat goods.
